Man blames 'blackout' for savage hostel stabbing

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The man who stabbed a woman 20 times in a Stockholm youth hostel has blamed a blackout for the incident and has been held on remand on the suspicion of attempted murder.

“He confessed to the abuse. He had some kind of a blackout,” said prosecutor Henrik Olsson Lilja to the Expressen newspaper.

The attacker, a 45-year-old tourist, had instigated the attack around 2.30am on Monday at the youth hostel, located near Fridhemsplan on the central Stockholm island of Kungsholmen.

The victim, a 38-year-old woman who is believed to have met the man previously, had been out with friends on watching a football match in northern Stockholm on Sunday night.

After arriving at the hostel in the early hours of Monday morning, the woman was attacked, with her screams of “don't kill me” waking up other guests at the hostel, one of whom intervened and pulled the attacker from the woman.

The woman was taken to hospital in Solna with 20 knife stabs in her back, and police, who were quick on the scene, arrested the man immediately.

The man has now claimed that the attack was not planned, according to prosecutors.

“He confesses the crime. There are s few special circumstances so I can't go into details, but he hasn't at all intended to do the things the prosecutor has stated," Olsson Lilja told the paper.

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